And finally…the bottom line-up

A bank has hired a motivational trainer to shave the heads and spank the backsides of underperforming staff.

A video has emerged showing the below par employees of Changzhi Zhangze Rural Commercial Bank, in China’s northern Shanxi province, being smacked on the backside with what appears to be a thick wooden slab.

The bank hired Jiang Yang to run a “performance breakthrough” course for its staff of more than 200.

After a day of the training course, Jiang demanded explanations from the eight employees with the weakest scores.

One replied, “I’m not hard on myself.” Another shouted, “I didn’t make a breakthrough!” while a third blamed lack of teamwork.

“Get your butts ready”, Jiang informed them, before striding up and down the row of offenders several times, whacking them loudly on their behinds with a plank.

The website of the Changzhi city government news office reports that he then went on to cut the women’s hair and shaved the men’s heads.

The punishment, captured in a mobile telephone video circulated on Chinese social media, has been met with criticism.

The training company declined requests by Reuters for comment, while telephone calls to the bank went unanswered and Jiang’s mobile phone appeared to have been switched off.

However, the trainer has wrtten on his blog that “Spanking was a training model I have been exploring for many years.”

In an online statement on Monday, the oversight body described the training as “improper,” adding that it had suspended the bank’s chairman and a deputy governor and told Jiang to make a public apology.